


Landsmeet

by thecryoftheseagulls



Series: Zeryn Brosca [6]
Category: Dragon Age: Origins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-04
Updated: 2014-08-04
Packaged: 2018-02-11 19:02:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2079543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thecryoftheseagulls/pseuds/thecryoftheseagulls
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Brief drabble exploring Zeryn Brosca's pov during the Landsmeet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Landsmeet

“I yield,” Loghain says. He looks at Zeryn Brosca with the disbelieving eyes of an old soldier, says, “I underestimated you, Warden. I thought you were like Cailan, a child wanting to play at war. I was wrong. There’s a strength in you I have not seen anywhere since Maric died.”

The words mean little to Zeryn. She knows she is strong, knew it on the streets of Dust Town with a cheap blade in hand before a year’s worth of running and fighting and plotting turned her into more warrior than thug. His flattery is empty. She bares her teeth under her helm.

“You’ll die for what you’ve done,” she growls.

Riordan, this man who calls her sister, interrupts.

“Wait! There is another option! The teyrn is a warrior and general of renown. Let him be of use. Let him go through the Joining.”

“You want to make him a Warden? Why?” Zeryn asks, pulling off her helmet and sheathing Starfang.

“There are three of us in all of Ferelden. And there are…compelling reasons to have as many Wardens on hand as possible to deal with the archdemon,” Riordan says.

“The Joining itself is often fatal, it is not?” Anora speaks up quickly, her tone perhaps too reasonable. “If he survives, you gain a general. If not, you have your revenge. Doesn’t that satisfy you?”

Zeryn thinks of Zevran, sent to kill her, and Sten, caged for the murder of an entire family. She hesitates. It is the cold fury on Alistair’s face that brings her back.

“Absolutely not!” he snarls. “Riordan, this man abandoned our brothers and then blamed us for the deed. He hunted us down like animals. He tortured you! How can we simply forget that?”

Zeryn feels her own anger bubble up in response. She thinks of all the long nights on the road, the constant threat of a knife in the back or a darkspawn attack on the camp. Loghain says Cailan played at war, when it is he who does the same. War does not excuse elven slaves in cages, tortured arl’s sons in dungeons, the betrayal of one’s king and friend to his death. Her people have been at war for centuries, their resistance to the darkspawn slowly worn away like the steady drip of water on stone. She has seen the Legion of the Dead fight without hope of reprieve in the eternal twilight of the Deep Roads – their unceasing vigilance keeps Orzammar from being overrun, while Loghain cuts ties with his allies and presumes to face the threat of a Blight alone. It is his childish need to keep the Orlesians from his country, his arrogance in believing that he alone can save Ferelden, that threatens to plunge the whole land into darkness. Zeryn has laid eyes on the archdemon in the Deep Roads, watched the endless file of darkspawn ranks to the surface. In her dreams, the demon’s eye is fixed on her as if it knows the futility of all her plans to stop it; as if, armies and allies aside, she is nothing, a puny duster playing at leadership. In her dreams, Cailan’s body impaled on the bridge at Ostagar turns to Alistair’s, a frozen death mask on his face, and the screams of the demon mix with Loghain’s laughter in the distance.

Zeryn does not play at war, because unlike Cailan, unlike Loghain, she knows she cannot win alone, and she knows she may yet fail. And what she cannot forgive is the grief writ large on Alistair’s face at every mention of Duncan’s name, and the broken body of the first man to say she was special raised high away from the Stone like a trophy.

“No, Loghain has to die for his crimes,” she says. She puts a gauntleted hand on Alistair’s arm, says, “Alistair, you should be the one to do this.”

“I will,” he says, voice cold. “I owe that to Duncan.”


End file.
